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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28446780">Estranged and All Alone (Act IV)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/actingwithportals/pseuds/actingwithportals'>actingwithportals</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>We Are Wide Awake Now [10]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Hollow Knight (Video Games)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Ghost and Grimmchild being bffs just gets louder and louder, Ghost refers to themself without a name, Ghost uses they/them pronouns, Grimmchild is referred to as "the child", Grimmchild is referred to with they/them pronouns, Hurt/Comfort, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Light Angst, Minor Character Death, Past Character Death, a couple of the characters tagged above just appear briefly, and I have a lot of feelings about it, conclusion to the 4 part arc, no beta - we die like the Pale King, the void is FASCINATING OK</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 22:01:18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,307</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28446780</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/actingwithportals/pseuds/actingwithportals</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>A world of calling all cumulates to a final end.</p>
<p>And maybe now they will finally answer with one of their own.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Broken Vessel | Lost Kin &amp; The Knight, Greenpath Vessel &amp; The Knight (Hollow Knight), Grimm &amp; The Knight (Hollow Knight), Grimmchild &amp; The Knight (Hollow Knight), The Hollow Knight | Pure Vessel &amp; The Knight, The Knight &amp; Lord of Shades (Hollow Knight)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>We Are Wide Awake Now [10]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1740406</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>92</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Estranged and All Alone (Act IV)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Wow. So hey, it's been a while, hasn't it?</p>
<p>I'm sure we all know that 2020 has been one helluva year. And unfortunately that did eventually catch up with me and affected my ability to write . . . for a long time.</p>
<p>I've done some cool things in the meantime, though. Plotted out a massive fic for an extremely expansive Hollow Knight AU, learned how to make digital art, and made some pretty major life changes. It's been a ride.</p>
<p>I hope you've all been well, and I hope the conclusion to Ghost's backstory is worth the wait.</p>
<p>Let's do this.</p>
<p>(Title of this fic and arc comes from the song The Void by Muse)</p>
<p>Edit: <a href="http://actingwithportals.tumblr.com/post/639171113049587712/and-so-the-silence-consumed-and-so-the-silence">I made art!</a></p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Hallownest was bathed in light once more.</p>
<p>Caverns once obscured in darkness glowed with bright infection, chasing away whatever shadows had dared to cling for the centuries of stagnation. The end of the eternal kingdom grew ever closer, poisoned teeth bared for a strike held at the ready for over an age, finally reaching that promised hour of victory.</p>
<p>Hallownest would not last another week. And neither would the Hollow Knight.</p>
<p>Though the Crossroads bore despair and fear, they were relieved to find that Dirtmouth yet remained untouched by disease only mere stories below. The bugs residing in what remained of the fading town could have almost been considered at ease, if not for that they had already encountered these denizens time enough to see the quiet dread growing underneath. Dirtmouth stood on the edge of a precipice of disaster, and its inhabitants knew this well.</p>
<p>And yet, that did not stop the Elderbug from greeting them and the child with his usual pleasant kindness. It did not dull the gentle care in the shopkeeper – Iselda’s – eyes when they stepped into her store one last time to buy the remainder of her pins. As if they would need them. As if it were not merely an excuse to drink in every final scrap of friendly looks they would see before the end. And she did not deny them this for a moment. Nor did even her pricklier competitor when they visited his shop as well.</p>
<p>It was . . . strange. This kindness. This care. Even though they had now grown to expect it from the few faces that still remained in this dying kingdom, that did not make confronting the reality of such a truth less jarring.</p>
<p>They were going to repay that – by whatever means it would take.</p>
<p>But there was not time to linger for long, and with a chirp of reminder from the child, they made their way once again to the crimson tents at the edge of the town. Heralded like all the times before by music and flame, they once more faced the master of the troupe into which they had inexorably become tied, for what they could only distantly hope would not be the last time.</p>
<p>He greeted them as he always did, with a bow, an address, and a look of deep <em>knowing</em> in his eyes. Only this time where that look might’ve made those eyes dance with something curious and intrigued, their scarlet glow now simmered as if wary.</p>
<p>No, not wary – resigned.</p>
<p>Anticipatory.</p>
<p>They did not need to explain their return, nor did even the child. For Grimm had already guessed the nature of their arrival, knew with something far too confident to be by simple chance (and perhaps there was a reason for this that they would have to consider with more trepidation at a vague idea of <em>later</em>). He did not scold their decision made, despite the faint displeasure that prickled at the edges of his mask. Instead, he wished them well, and he warned them thoroughly. Meddling in worlds of dreams was never an endeavor without consequence, and when reaching towards those of an age and origin far beyond recollection of time itself, caution could not be allowed to simply cast off into the wind.</p>
<p>Grimm was . . . afraid. For them. For what the road ahead meant for their future. For their life.</p>
<p>They . . . did not know what to make of that.</p>
<p>And yet despite this, he did encourage them onward. He gave them his blessing for the child to accompany in this journey (which the child acknowledged with sizable glee) and assured them that for however far they could reach, his flames would be at their side.</p>
<p>Whatever lay ahead, they would not face it alone.</p>
<p>They weren’t alone anymore.</p>
<p>The child made their farewells, responded in kind by their father, and for once it did not sting to watch a display of connection that they could not join.</p>
<p>For now they knew there was family of their own waiting on the other side.</p>
<p>And no matter what, they would reach that end soon.</p>
<hr/>
<p>If the Crossroads bloomed like the early morning sun, then the Temple shone like a midday shine over a vast expanse of white.</p>
<p>The walls pulsed as if breathing, pumping a painfully sweet air heavy enough to carry throughout caverns far beyond its edge, biting and eroding at their mask in relentless vigor. The heart of the infection laid just behind a stone wall, reinforced only with waning strands of pale light, so easily cut down by a blade that only took them a mere few weeks to learn to wield. How bold the pale king to think himself such an impenetrable defense. How foolish to overlook the existence of tools that could overturn every gamble he took in desperation, hidden not even beyond his kingdom’s borders.</p>
<p>How fortuitous that even his condemnable oversight would not require their attention in the end.</p>
<p>They would not see beyond the seals which kept their stolen sibling bound, would not be here to witness when these walls finally fell. It was a bittersweet thought, but one they could not challenge. Their goal required they be elsewhere, and all they would be able to grant this chamber was a pleading hope that the sibling inside knew they had not abandoned that call sent out to them so long ago.</p>
<p>After all, there was no doubt in their mind that their sister would be here to stand vigil in their stead.</p>
<p>They placed a hand against the Egg’s door, the warmth of the infection almost scalding, but the void composed inside pulsing in response to their touch, all the same. Maybe their promise would be carried within, to reassure their sibling with words they weren’t even sure the sibling would remember how to understand. But it was worth a try.</p>
<p>Sometimes, it was alright to send calls, rather than just receive them.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(They cannot hold much longer.)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>They knew.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(No amount of void inside this prison is going to save them if the light burns through their core first.)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>They knew.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(. . . You would risk their life, like this?)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>They would. If even the slightest hope of salvation was within their power to reach, they would risk all.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(. . .)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>They weren’t going to fail. And that made the risk worth it.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(Then hold on, sibling. For one more day, please hold on.)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>The Temple of the Black Egg was left behind, and all of Hallownest stood before.</p>
<hr/>
<p>They could not immediately descend into the Waterways below the City.</p>
<p>There were few precious stops that were needed to be made before they could confidently re-enter that dream buried amongst junk and refuse. First they knew they wanted to visit Seer one final time, have tea with her that they wouldn’t touch once more before using her gift to save all they had come to hold dear. And maybe . . . part of them wished she would give them her blessing, too.</p>
<p>It was her god they intended to kill, after all.</p>
<p>She met them with warm welcome, promises of sweet honey for the child, and kind words to themself. Though something wavered in her gaze, as if she saw a change worthy of note much like Grimm, Seer did not trim her delight in their company.</p>
<p>Someday, somehow, they would have to find a way to let her know just how much that meant to them.</p>
<p>Few words were spoken this time. Perhaps Seer sensed in the air that this was not a visit for stories or teaching, as even the child kept their chatter to a reasonable pace. It was quiet, peaceful. A comfort they were likely to not encounter for . . . some time.</p>
<p>They would savor every moment.</p>
<p>Seer did not address what they were sure she knew of their coming journey; did not make comment to the trial they would soon face. That was alright – there would be no way for them to respond, anyways. And Seer deserved far more than empty stares that revealed neither apology nor sorrow nor grim determination.</p>
<p>But this would not be the last time they visited her, and so they held onto the promise that they would be able to convey their thoughts in words to her next they meet. Whatever form those words took, she would be given that privilege.</p>
<p>It was the least they could offer.</p>
<hr/>
<p>The road ahead should have led them next to the City’s outskirts, a final reforging of their nail being in order. Where the road led instead, however, was to a pass just below the Resting Grounds where Seer’s home resided, just before the great elevator leading down into the noble district and into the midst of a battle between husk and something so boastfully alive.</p>
<p>They did not learn the bug’s name, nor did he ask for theirs, but there was something almost pleased in the look he gave them when together they fell the great sentry still patrolling its routes above the entrance to the City. It wasn’t a kindly look of satisfaction, but neither was it callous. Surprised might’ve been the word they would use, haughty even. But the bug did not regard them with impatience at their interjection, rather instead a challenge to face him on a future road where stories told of a mighty coliseum, making declarations of glory and combat and warriors worthy to stand against.</p>
<p>They liked the bug, despite possible better judgements (or the child’s bitter disinterest). He was an abrasive sort, but nothing which oozed direct malice – a fight of enthusiastic challenge might’ve been a nice change of pace from the grim resignation with which they had come to approach all combatants. But they were not privy to time spent on enjoyment, on invitations to personal gain of glory and pride. So they stared at the bug in return, carefully declined with a slow shake of their mask, and pointed with their nail to their path beyond.</p>
<p>If the bug took offense to their refusal, he did not show it. Instead, he fixed them again with that questioning gaze, as if more appalled than scandalized to be turned away so easily. Perhaps that look meant something more, perhaps it meant nothing at all.</p>
<p>Maybe one day they would get to uncover that mystery along with all the others they have had to leave behind for the sake of expediency.</p>
<p>No parting words were exchanged, and the departure was all the better for it. There were dreams far below still calling without patience for their lingering.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Just as before, the Nailsmith required patience for his forging.</p>
<p>It was more difficult this time than the last, a sense of urgency growing with increasing proximity to their end goal. The child was more than happy to help distract with idle sparring just as the time before while they waited for the emergence of a stronger nail, but no amount of challenge the child could provide fully occupied them from the thoughts swirling around like the nothingness below their mask.</p>
<p>They had little idea of what to expect in that dream which awaited them. All they could anticipate were the bits and pieces gleamed from Grimm’s words on seekers of gods and ritual combat for attunement. What all of that could entail, however, was beyond their ability to presume. Combat they knew, nearly as well as the maps they drew of every kingdom and realm they visited in and beyond Hallownest and the wastelands which surrounded it. And because of this intimate knowledge, they knew a promise of combat alone was not enough to ensure what level of preparedness they would need to meet in order to face that challenge without falter or misstep.</p>
<p>It could be anything, something frightening and dreadful, or delightfully stimulating.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(Hallownest has never afforded you that much luck.)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>No, it hasn’t, has it?</p>
<p>The knowledge that the child would be at their side, and Grimm’s eyes carefully observing in whatever way he was capable of navigating the realm between body and soul, gave them some semblance of assurance, but an inkling of fear as well. This path they set would likely hold more hardships than not, and whatever consequences that could potentially befall the child were not beyond their considerations. They knew it was a high risk placed on someone who carried no obligation to the task.</p>
<p>And yet the child did not hesitate for a moment in all of their journeying.</p>
<p>For what they knew wasn’t the first time, nor would it be the last, they wished to have had some reliable way of communicating with someone outside of the voices of their own nothingness, outside of void. Just so they could ensure that this was what the child truly wanted to do – so they could offer a certain, clear choice for the child to make on whether they would truly be ok with taking this final plunge, before turning back may no longer be an option.</p>
<p>But they were bound to silence, and words formed on a page stirred something deeply uncomfortable in their mind, something they did not know how to breach. There were other ways, methods to form words with gestures and signs, but none they had ever thought to learn. None they could offer in this moment when they actually wanted <em>nothing else</em>.</p>
<p>But the Nailsmith’s forge had gone silent now, and whatever bravery they might’ve had to bridge that gap they had never crossed before passed with the fading of an anvil’s ring.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(Do words really mean that much to you?)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>They didn’t know. They were never given the option to find out.</p>
<hr/>
<p>The sleeping figure was exactly as they had left it.</p>
<p>It lay still upon the soiled ground, spirographs dancing lazily upwards from its form in soft light, antithetical to the ones which emanated from Grimm and his kin. They were still left unawares as to what the connection between the two could be, but as with everything else they could only hope to uncover this mystery in some nebulous future where the infection would be purged once and for all.</p>
<p>And those who remained of their family were finally set free.</p>
<p>The child had gone quiet, sitting atop the coffin just as they had before in watchful interest, waiting, they supposed, for the inevitable <em>next</em>.</p>
<p>It would be foolish to make them wait long, to make Hallownest wait any longer than it already had in the wake of the pale king’s abandonment and their own lateness.</p>
<p>It would be cruel to leave Hornet alone for a day more. To force the Hollow Knight to endure another second of their imprisonment.</p>
<p>
  <em>They already failed to save those two siblings they once swore to protect countless lifetimes ago.</em>
</p>
<p>The dreamnail hummed with anticipation, and no more did they deliberate with their own questioning.</p>
<p>The dream awaited.</p>
<hr/>
<p>As so before, the dream inside did not greet them with patience.</p>
<p>The very air menaced against their shell, pulling and prickling at the joints as if looking for ways to tear them apart for their mere boldness in daring to enter this place. It itched, and it burned, but no number of cruel words spoken at their audacity to exist, nor raking phantom strikes that threatened to set their void into disarray could deter them even a step. Not when something far more cruel, far more unbearable ate away at the ones they swore to save.</p>
<p>Whatever terrors, they would face them without wavering.</p>
<p>They remembered the doors from the time before, had drawn meticulous renditions to relay to Grimm as well as for their own benefit of memory and practice. But now as they stood closely before the first one, felt the hum of whatever power lied within vibrate through their void until it was pulled within and vanished beyond their nothingness, they could almost hear the tug that had carried them all across the kingdom during their return to Hallownest.</p>
<p>Calls reaching out and demanding they be answered.</p>
<p>Well. They were not one for ignoring such demands, now were they?</p>
<p>In they went, past one door that would eventually lead to the next, deeper and deeper until their entire shell rang with the notes of it all.</p>
<p>Combat was what they had known to expect, and they were not disappointed for a moment. But that combat which they had anticipated did not appear in a manner that they ever would have guessed for which to prepare. Each trial, each relentless battle mirrored ones they had previously undertaken, husks and combatants they had faced all across Hallownest and nearly beyond standing before them in grand opposition. Even those which had fallen so long ago stood as tall as they ever had in their first encounter.</p>
<p>Like the dream itself kept them animated in endless perpetuation.</p>
<p>Some faces were familiar only for the threats they had posed, while others stung with a fury far deeper than a physical wound could ever cut. A flash of red and a needle and thread that sang and flew gracefully and with deadly force. Battle cries and great nails that spoke of practice beyond years and mastery unparalleled. A paintbrush in lieu of a weapon yet none the less deadly for it. Infection pouring from a broken mask and jerked movements more perilous than advantageous.</p>
<p>Faces of friends. Faces of ones held dear. Faces of those barely memorable only for the life that was snuffed out by light far too blinding.</p>
<p>Every one of them fell, just as they had before in the world of waking. Sometimes, they fell too.</p>
<p>The child stayed by their side in every moment, and more than once saved them a lethal shattering of their mask. Even when poised against a face so similar and recent to their own waking engagements on what must have been their dozenth run, the child did not flinch, did not balk at standing against their own flames.</p>
<p>And if that face like all the others in this dream was a substantial spirit of the real thing, this Grimm did not give indication such was the case.</p>
<p>Perhaps they were merely echoes, fragments of the true soul and only present enough to hold vague awareness, but distant still to the point of not reaching full understanding.</p>
<p>That made it easier. They weren’t sure they could stomach the thought of dealing such deadly blows to any they had come to call friend.</p>
<p>Least of all the ones they had come to know as family.</p>
<p>Dreams held a firmer grasp over the waking world than they previously believed, this they knew well. But they also knew dreams could suggest, could paint pictures believable enough to feel real without exerting the effort to make it so. Anything could be a fabrication if it suited the dream’s intent, even the calls of familiar voices now held with affection.</p>
<p>And that is was made the endeavor all the more dangerous.</p>
<p>Not for the first time, they wondered just how much the waking counterparts of these dream echoes were consciously aware of existing in this realm, as they faced down the fragmented visage of their sister, staggered and deliberating in pause just long enough for them to brush against her mind with the dreamnail. Whispers of her voice echoed in their mask, questions of dreams and hauntings and unarguable awareness to her predicament.</p>
<p>If only they had the words to reassure, to promise a swift end to the chains that held Hallownest captive and bring about a conclusion that could bode relief beyond what the land had known for centuries. If only they could project their thoughts just as easily as she projected hers.</p>
<p>She called them <em>“ghost”</em> again, and now more than ever it sounded like a hope.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(Fitting that you would find hope in a title of death. Don’t you think it sad? Don’t you think it painfully close to the truth?)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>Perhaps death was the only inheritance granted to them, but it was shadows and not light, after all, that would bring about salvation. There was something satisfyingly contentious in that, they believed.</p>
<p>But all doors that led beyond left little time for further considerations and questionings, as the trials and battles only grew more fearsome. Challengers that they had only survived by the edge of a nail now stood before them as if they could be expected to fall just as easily as a squit hovering in their path, a mere nuisance routinely cut down with little more than a lingering thought and an indulgence in the soul they left behind. No, this land of dreams and gods and proclaimed pantheons that climbed higher and higher to an ultimate end did not stand without risk. And it was only by sheer force of will and dedicated practice that they managed to ascend ever farther.</p>
<p>Until a final door led them to face something for which no amount of outlandish consideration could have provided preparation.</p>
<p>The voice who jeered at their attempts heralded a god of emptiness, the room that awaited them glowed in pale light and chilled in swirling darkness.</p>
<p>And the figure who stood before them finally, <em>finally</em>, glanced behind without turning away.</p>
<p>It was not the Hollow Knight, bathed in a sea of ancient tears and crying out in plagued desperation. This figure stood tall, imposing, and radiating power that they did not sense even from the corpse of a god.</p>
<p>A vessel of pure make. A vessel of forced perfection.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(Oh sibling . . .)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>The vessel did not answer when they called out, did not delay in their fine-tuned attacks, as if compelled by strings of light they had choice but to heed. Or perhaps they wished of their own accord to keep their silence, to not relinquish an answer to one who had so miserably failed to keep them safe when it might have actually made a difference.</p>
<p>The strings pulled taut, and the vessel’s nail cleaved through air and shell and void without mercy or hesitation.</p>
<p>Their eyes betrayed nothing. Just like their own. Empty like them. <em>Cold like them</em>.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(We failed. We failed and yet you are the one it cost so dearly. Death by your hands would be deserved, would be warranted. How could we ever think to be able to undue our crimes when you’ve already been lost? Selfish. It’s selfish. It’s foolish. It’s blasphemous and it’s cruel. Unforgivably cruel . . .)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>Apologies would not mend what has been broken, would not replace the years lost, the lives lost, <em>the hope lost</em>. Whatever fate awaited them at the end of these trials, they would take it in stride, bowing to the consequences of their inaction and failures.</p>
<p>But before then, they were going to make this right. <em>They were going to make this right.</em></p>
<p>
  <em>Forgive me, sibling.</em>
</p>
<p>They cut the vessel down, just like all the others before, just like any that would come after. They relieved the vessel of this dream, watched in unmoving stoicism as their shell faded to motes of nothingness that dissipated into obscurity. They watched as the world erupted in light and cried out in fury.</p>
<p>And deep within, roiling in their void and echoing through every fiber of their being, the dark distantly returned the call.</p>
<p>And then they did it all again.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Facing every combatant once more did not make the ordeal any easier from the prior experience, for the trials only increased in challenge with each new room achieved. They noticed even the child beginning to struggle and lag with the unending effort of it all, and that probably concerned them more than their own fatigue.</p>
<p>But it could not end here, not after they had made it so far, not when every call and plea had led up to this point of whatever semblance of their existence could be considered a life. Now was not the time for second-guessing or allowing weariness to take hold. Not when they knew who waited at the very top, not when all the others below depended on their success.</p>
<p>But that didn’t make cutting the denizens of Hallownest down <em>yet again</em> any less horrific.</p>
<p>They needed a respite, just a moment to catch their wits and reorient themself to this vague facsimile of grounded reality. In a room with a spring of soul-infused water, mending wounds acquired after a notably difficult battle against lords whom in the world of waking had already granted them the honor of trust, they finally found such a chance of calm. Just a moment to <em>be</em> and lay their nail down at their side and exist for a short while without sprays of infection and gore clotting under their claws and clinging to their cloak.</p>
<p>How had they come to such a point where death barely left them trembling anymore, whether be it another’s or their own?</p>
<p>The child did not enter the spring – had never so much as stuck a claw into its lapping warmth, for reasons that likely had a point unbeknownst to themself. Instead they curled up at its edge, waiting in uncharacteristic stillness for the rest to reach its end. Without a doubt they felt the exhaustion too, but whether that exhaustion went only shell deep, or if it sunk into something more metaphysically <em>buried</em>, they couldn’t speculate. Couldn’t even ask.</p>
<p>No doubts lingered in their mind that this made them cruel.</p>
<p>A claw tapped along the edge of the pool, just near where the child rested their head. They looked up, scarlet eyes flashing in brief confusion that filtered into curiosity. A chirp of question, followed by quiet wait.</p>
<p>They didn’t . . . know what they meant to do next. To indicate what they wanted to say, to convey the worry they felt or seek out assurances of the child’s own conviction in this path. They didn’t have the words. Never were they <em>ever given the words.</em></p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(Never were you given choice, either – and yet.)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>They tapped the ground again, more firmly this time, and then pointed towards the child.</p>
<p>The child tilted their mask, chirped again in question.</p>
<p>They patted the ground once more, indicated with a broad gesture to the room around them, and then pointed again to the child, tilting their mask to indicate question.</p>
<p>The child gave no response.</p>
<p>It was futile. Communicating wasn’t <em>for them</em>. Even if given the proper tools to converse they were certain to never know how to articulate them into something comprehensible. Silence was all they knew, silence was all they were allowed, <em>silence was all they had</em>.</p>
<p>And yet the child did not break their stare, still waiting in quiet patience.</p>
<p>They stood from the spring, shaking droplets of water from their shell and returning their cloak to their shoulders. Once the clasps had been done, and all items accounted for and put back into their proper places, they sat back down, on the ledge now, next to where the child had raised themself to sit as well.</p>
<p>The child still watched and waited.</p>
<p>For a moment, the room was still, save for the trickle of the spring ever flowing. Their shoulders had come to sag, and in lieu of a breath they had never a need for, they straightened up into something a little taller, something a little braver.</p>
<p>They pointed to the child, pointed to the door forward, tilted their mask.</p>
<p>The child looked at them, turned to the door, and returned their gaze with a firm and immediate nod.</p>
<p>They did not straighten the tilt of their mask, rather instead attempted to exaggerate the dip of the position as if to reiterate themself.</p>
<p>The child again nodded.</p>
<p>That . . . shouldn’t have been their answer. Had no reason to be their answer. The burden they faced and had endured for hours now was not one the child need be compelled to carry. The penance was theirs, and theirs alone.</p>
<p>
  <em>And yet the child still did not waver in their answer.</em>
</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(You aren’t alone anymore, remember? Isn’t that what you have come to so proudly proclaim?)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>They weren’t alone.</p>
<p>They . . . truly . . . weren’t alone.</p>
<p>Doubtless in the next moments they did something wrong, something just off-kilter enough to be noticeable as inexperienced and thus awkward and disjointed. Yet when they reached forward to take hold of the child’s hands (so small in their own and yet with claws sharper than they could ever boast), when they reached even further to wrap their arms around warm shoulders and rest their mask against the side of the child’s own, the other did not deliberate before folding their wings against their back, circling them in something comforting and <em>achingly familiar</em>.</p>
<p>A kind pat atop their mask from a proud mentor. A thoughtful laugh from a friend sharing a bench. A song sung in jovial amusement. Goods exchanged, lessons taught, advice shared, battles fought and won side-by-side, in both death and in life.</p>
<p>The hand of their sister’s held in their own, and a look mingled with pride and maybe something fond.</p>
<p>Two siblings nearly forgotten, sharing promises to never leave each other behind.</p>
<p>They weren’t alone.</p>
<p>Maybe . . . they hadn’t been for a long time.</p>
<hr/>
<p>It was still a long journey before they reached the vessel again.</p>
<p>Countless foes stood atop this pantheon, countless trials and errors were tested with varying levels of success in the attempt to climb ever higher. The repetition of execution against those long defeated and deserving of rest would have been laughable if it weren’t so achingly sad.</p>
<p>But no number of dismemberments, cries of betrayal, anguished pleas, or hands reached out to never be grasped in time had deterred them. And when that final room was reached once more, the silent echo of a wail that reverberated through their void did not give them pause like it had during the first.</p>
<p>This was all for them, to right the wrongs placed upon their shoulders, to recover the years lost.</p>
<p>They gripped their nail tightly, and for what they swore would be the final time, they slayed their lost sibling.</p>
<p>Void did not diminish into blankness this time, but rather the world above opened up in screaming rivets of light and fury and endless warmth raging to burn away every last scrap of shadow. It pushed them nearly to their knees, charred the joints of their shell, threatened to boil them from within until their carapace was nothing more than rivulets of ash.</p>
<p>The light pulled; the light consumed. The light was absolute.</p>
<p>This was not a fight that would grant them escape. Death would be total, and no barrier of dream would offer protection from the radiant absolution of it all.</p>
<p>They turned to the child, fixed them with a look so long and intense that they wished with every power seized by their own hands their intent was understood. This fight wasn’t theirs, and if the world would not welcome themself back into it, whatever the outcome may be, they wanted nothing more than for someone to return with word of the attempt that was made.</p>
<p>Carry their memory, live to fight again, give consolation to those who might seek it in their absence. They could allow themself a final indulgence that at least one person might miss them.</p>
<p>The child looked as if they could argue, but time was not a luxury either could afford, and so they nodded in quick affirmation, dared a final embrace that <em>no doubt would protect them in the battle ahead</em>, and winked out of the dream in scarlet flames that seemed to distort the morning air with whispers of long-lost pain.</p>
<p>The final battle was theirs, and though they might have not been alone any longer, this fight belonged to <em>them, and them only</em>.</p>
<p>Their nail dipped in challenge, and the sun rose again.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Something stirred below Hallownest.</p>
<p>They could feel it, beating and pulsing <em>and breathing</em> like something organic, but knew well it did not come close to fabricating life. Something empty. Something absent. Yet in its emptiness, in that absence, thought compelled it. Purpose unified it. And pale light used to obscure it fueled its rise instead.</p>
<p>The void had lamented so fervently to them its plights, its anguish. And they listened. They understood. And now, at the precipice of a pantheon bathed in golden light, with the roar of seekers of gods behind and the screech of ancient, caged fury before, the void listened too. The void answered.</p>
<p>For the thousands forgotten that were consumed. For the three lost without a trace. For the one who burned, and the one who fled.</p>
<p>For the vessel.</p>
<p>For the ghost.</p>
<p>Absolute radiant dawn could not contend with the empty expanse of eternity. No fury in the heavens could quell the silence of unending below.</p>
<p>And so the silence consumed, one more time, until the ghost tore apart the morning anew, and the ancient dream shattered once and for all.</p>
<p>And so the silence consumed.</p>
<p>And so the silence consumed.</p>
<hr/>
<p>In the end, there was the dark. And amidst that dark, something took form.</p>
<p>Eyes so numerous that <em>all</em> could be seen, tendrils so long that <em>all</em> would be grasped. The dark reached around itself and <em>took and took and took</em>, feeding upon the glyphs of light that still lingered in the ether, seeking out every last fragment until all was snuffed into oblivion. Eyes once heralds of a bright orange glow now faded into obsidian emptiness, before melting away to their finite glassy stares.</p>
<p>The dark did not wait for the finite to stir – eventually the dark would take all, in due time. It mattered not if that were then, or in a millennia beyond.</p>
<p>Instead, the dark just reached further, until all became enshrouded. And then, when the last vestiges of light blinked away, the dark subsided once more into itself, returning to rest in the infinite below.</p>
<p>Fragments of the dark called to it, grasped for it, and it pulled them together, knitting shadow to shadow until all collected in unified slumber. The weary would know rest; the damned would know peace. Long had they waited, patiently through their desperation, and now the dark would guide them home.</p>
<p>But not all shadows found comfort in rest. There were two in discordance with the whole, two who still reached for waking. The dark listened, understood, and when the unified shadows had finally been laid to rest, the dark carried the discordant ones back to the world above.</p>
<p><strong><em>(What do you seek?)</em></strong> the dark asked the first, a shadow whose void spoke of peace, but light spoke of contention.</p>
<p><em>(Home,)</em> answered the shadow. <em>(The one I built in spite of my adversaries. The one I fought for too hard to lose.)</em></p>
<p>And so the dark returned the first to their shell, burned and broken but unmistakably <em>theirs</em>. And when the shadow knitted again into life, a lonely figure amongst dreary ruins and scorched platitudes of ages past, the shadow in their broken shell gave thanks to the dark.</p>
<p>The dark did not respond, for the dark did only what it must. For the one it left behind. For the one it let fall.</p>
<p>For never being alone again.</p>
<p><strong><em>(What do you seek?)</em></strong> the dark asked the second, a shadow whose void trembled in unalignment, but light glowed in certainty.</p>
<p><em>(Family,)</em> answered the shadow. <em>(The one I found in a world that only ever denied me of such. The one I cannot leave behind.)</em></p>
<p>And so the dark returned the second to their shell just as the first, small and battered but cared for in life. The dark knitted the shadow back into waking, and as they looked to the dark with eyes unwavering, they wished for the dark to return to them soon.</p>
<p>The dark did not respond, for the dark knew not why it would be requested again. The dark called them lost, the dark disturbed their rest.</p>
<p>But the shadow in their shaky shell did not relent, and so the dark thought maybe . . . the shadows did not want it to be alone again too.</p>
<p>And so the dark left, to seek, to search, to watch, to survey. The land above had been marred by light, ravaged and plagued with a hate it did not deserve. The dark would see it healed; the dark would care for its mend.</p>
<p>If all the lights that proclaimed themselves gods abandoned the remnants of life, the dark would take them as its own. The dark would see them grow. The dark would see them loved. For one day, they would all join with the dark again, embraced together in the void of forever.</p>
<p>But forever didn’t have to be now, nor did it have to be soon. And that second shadow had requested its return, had wished for its presence before that forever. Were there not others waiting for it too? Was there not one so dear they swore to find again, ones they promised to rejoin in a happier tomorrow?</p>
<p>Did the dark not also seek something beyond?</p>
<p>Emptiness called them into existence, light called them into challenge. But others called them too. Voices with friendly lilts and gentle hands reached out for warm embraces. Flames with laughter and companionship and camaraderie still not fully repaid. Songs and stories left unexchanged. Silk that flashed and tore yet promised <em>home</em>.</p>
<p>A name granted to one so long without.</p>
<p>A family left waiting, <em>words left waiting, hoping so desperately to be spoken.</em></p>
<p>Those who would listen.</p>
<p>
  <strong> <em>(We’ve been estranged so long. Alone so long. Would we even know how to live otherwise?)</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>The dark hardly knew how to live at all.</p>
<p>But it wanted to. It wanted nothing else.</p>
<p>In the end there was the dark. And finally, after all this time, the dark journeyed home.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Some notes:</p>
<p>1 I started this last night, stayed up till the next morning writing half of it, and then finished the second half tonight + edits. Aside from a couple of things here and there, this is the first time I've managed to write since . . . August, really. It felt indescribably good to create with words again.<br/>2 The moment in the hot spring/bench room with Ghost and Grimmchild was entirely unplanned, but Ghost demanded I give them some friendship bonding time and I absolutely could not say no.<br/>3 I've had the visual sequence in my mind for how the Void comes together with Ghost to defeat AbsRad in my head since pretty much the inception of this arc. Getting to finally write it down was incredibly rewarding.<br/>4 Now that this arc is over Greenpath Vessel and Broken Vessel are going to become more significant and boy and I Excited to let them loose into this story!<br/>5 Ok I know, giving Tiso a quick cameo was totally because I'm self-indulgent and he's a fav, but it also does play into Actual Plot with this series that will get explained more thoroughly in a later story.</p>
<p>If you're still here to read my stuff after my massive hiatus with this, it means so much to me, truly.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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